DEATHLANDS : MUTANT - THE GATHERING
by richard.coleman.98
Summary: A story of a group of mutants in a forever changed and post-apocalyptic world. Note : This is fan fiction based in the James Axler Deathlands books world. It is for mature audience only as it contains strong themes not suitable for children. If you read this and feel something needs adjusting, then please let me know. Thank you.


**Chapter 1: A44 FX - Amy Childs**

"Well I'll be fucked senseless by a doubled dicked mutie mule!".

From behind the safety of a sea of greenery Hector McFadden rubbed his eyes with dirty, tobacco stained fingers and looked out again at the small figure coming along the dirt track that wound up from the wooded valley below. His first thought was that he must be dreaming or still partially high from sniffing that rusty tin of glue he and his brother Eoin had found in a derelict factory last week, for what he saw seemed to be straight out of some drug or jolt induced erotic fantasy. A young girl, no more than about thirteen or fourteen was skipping towards him, humming happily to herself and stopping now and then to bend down and smell the odd daisy that struggled to poke its way out into its shady, leaf-vaulted habitat. She was dressed in a pair of white sneakers, purple shorts and a faded pink t-shirt that appeared to have the words 'Girl Power' emblazoned on the front. Hector had no idea what 'Girl Power' was and to be honest he didn't give a rats-arse.

Her hair was long and blonde and tied in two pony-tails that hung down over her as-yet not fully formed breasts. She carried a small pack on her back, but by the lack of it hampering her gait, it unlikely held a great fortune. There was a necklace of some kind hanging around her neck with a small pendant attached, though from the distance Hector couldn't tell what the necklace was made of, but he doubted it could be expensive – only a well-protected Baron's wife or a feeb wore jewelry these days, especially all alone and out in the middle of nowhere.

The one odd thing about her appearance was that she wore a pair of over-sized black leather gloves on her hands, which seemed to be in total contrast to the rest of her pastel, waif-like appearance, but since Hector could already feel himself beginning to stir south of his waist-line and dismissed the oddity in his rising state of sexual excitement.

Pulling back from the edge of the bushes he quickly crossed over the small clearing to where his older brother Eoin lay sleeping under a well-worn blanket with more stains on it than any that could be found in the gaudy houses they regularly frequented. His brother never snored - even with his numerously broken nose - but with his front two teeth missing every other exhalation or so sounded like an old-time steam train pulling into the station.

He needed to wake him up quickly lest the noise give away their position to the potential young bounty, so he nudged his brother's leg with the toe of his taped-up boot. Eoin opened his eyes, instinctively raising the barrel of the cheap replica World War II German Luger from under his blanket. The gun had no bullets in it, it was after all just a well-made kids toy, but only he and his brother knew it was a fake. Most of the time in the Deathlands when someone found themselves at the business end of any sort of firearm they tended to think it was the real deal and that there was at least one potential round in the chamber with their name written on it. Certainly nobody had ever got close enough to read the 'Made in China' stamped on the bottom of the hand-grip.

Hector held up a finger to his beard shrouded lips and his brother immediately understood the need to be quiet and listen. "Pay-dirt bro'. Teen girl. Hot as a rad-zone. Easy pickings!" His voice was just above a whisper.

"She on her own" asked Eoin, rubbing a hand over his eyes to get the sleep out of them.

"Far as I can see", said Hector.

A leering smile crept up Hector's face – it was matched by one that steadily appeared on Eoin's as he took the information in.

Tucking the Luger into his trousers, Eoin held out his hand for his brother to help him up off the floor and with a groan he pulled himself up. It was only when the brothers were standing that the difference in paternal genes could be seen, for whereas Hector was tall and gangly, his brother Eoin was atleast six inches shorter, broader and more thickset, his muscular arms covered with crude tattoos of very improbable proportioned women. Hector also sported considerable left-over facial scar tissue from a severe case of chicken-pox as a child. But despite the sizable difference, the receding ginger hair, bushy brows and green eyes clearly marked them out as kin. Their mother never talked to them much about their fathers, probably due to not being sure which customer had sired the bastards in the first place, but she had instilled in them a fierce family loyalty, that more than made up for any differing fatherly genes.

Circumventing round the small fire pit containing a few still glowing coals, stepping over the rubbish and their few meager possessions that lay strewn haphazardly around the small secluded campsite, the brothers made their way over to the foliage that hid them from view of on-coming travelers. The petite girl now no more than about seventy meters away. She was standing looking up into a tree at something, her head cocked to one side. Hector assumed it was one of the black and white, two-tailed squirrels that they had dined on for supper last night. The way the beast had tasted, his brother had commented that it was probably the offspring of a skunk that had fucked one of its ancestors, but he had still finished the plate and soaked up the greasy residue with a lump of stale bread. Both had had the shits about two hours later.

Eoin made a silent 'whoa' with his mouth and pulled down his brother's shoulder to whisper in his ear. "You weren't kidding, Hecky. Looks like we're gonna have some seriously sore cocks and empty bollocks for the next few days with this juicy fruit".

"Long as I get first dips for spotting the bitch". Hector said. "Don't want your sloppy seconds this early in the morning. I may have a bigger cock than you, but when you come it's like the tank hasn't been emptied in six months! ".

"Bigger cock, my arse!". Eoin held up his right hand in a fist, then raised his little finger. "That seems about right to me, Hecky. That's what Big Wendy told me after you plucked up enough courage to finally shag the slut. Said you didn't even touch the sides and she had to finish herself off".

Hector sniggered, despite the riling from his brother. "Hell, you could ride and fully grown horse into her hole sideways and she wouldn't feel it!"

"That's as may be, but you still get to ride this young mare after me. Age has to count for something and besides you should thank me".

His young brother creased his brow. "Why the hell's that"

"She could be a mutie.

Hector looked from his brother to the girl now slowly edging closer, taking in her innocent visage and trying to think in what way what was in-front of him could possibly be any form of mutie. Sure, the Deathlands was full of all kinds of mutated horrors that the unsuspecting fell victims to, ranging from flesh eating flowers and insects to huge octopus like creatures that lived under the sands ,but he failed to see in what way this cute and fuckable piece of arse could do him any harm. Unless it was exhaustion.

He returned his gaze to Eoin. "You're just trying to wind me up so that you get to dip your wick first".

Eoin rolled his tongue around the inside of his cheek, feeling a cold sore that had come up while he slept . "Hecky, do you remember old Pete 'Digger' Dodds ?"

Hector's brow wrinkled. "What the scav they found frozen to death in the gaudy outhouse three years or so back ?"

"That's the one".

"Thought he died of exposure, fell asleep on the can with his trousers round his ankles and the door open in the middle a snowstorm. Never woke up".

"Well, that's what they told everyone " said Eoin. "Only that's not the whole story. Truth is, when they found him all the skin from his upper thighs to his lower stomach was missing. Doc Thompson told me that it looked like some sort of giant leech had attached itself to him and sucked him dry, virtually gutted him and ripped off his balls and prick in the process too. I remember once helping to throw him out of the Pussy Palace for a free hand-job, took six of us to lift the heavy bastard. Only took two of us to lift what was left of him of the can when they found him that morning. Glowing nuke-shit, brother, I sure as hell hope that never happens to me".

Hector rubbed the bald spot on the back of his head, something he unconsciously tended to do when he felt a little anxious. "And just what the fuck has this got to do with her", he jabbed a finger in the direction of the approaching girl.

"When Doc asked around a bit a few days later he found out that the old-timer had been seen taking some new slut out back, presumably to get a discount quickie in the shit-house before Wendy realized they were both missing and asked for her cut. When the whore couldn't be found in the morning for a customer looking for something fresh, Wendy just put the missing girl down to her believing she could make a living without being spread-eagled and some ape grinding away on her – Wendy's words not mine – and done a runner back to ma and pa".

"Still don't see the connection", said Hector.

"I'm getting there Hecky, hold on". Eoin reached a hand into his collar and pulled out a dry leaf that had somehow wiggled its way in there. He scrunched it up and let the debris fall like brown snowflakes to the floor. "Just to be on the safe side and to protect her reputation, Wendy offered a few shells and a ride of choice to anyone who could track the whore down and see if she knew anything about old Dodds. Of course, me and a few of the lads jumped at the chance of some free action and agreed to have a go. She wasn't hard to find. She was in the next but one ville over, working as a seamstress in some family run store – seemed the father figure was some religious nut, absolving sinners and giving them honest work to get a new foothold in life. Fools those religious types. It was millions of tons of TNT that dispatched their fore-bearers to their so-called utopia, not their savior's second coming".

"And ?" asked Hector, who was now rubbing his balding head with more vigor.

"We caught her in the alley that ran down the outside of the store when she had gone out to take a leak before bed and nicely asked her a couple of questions – well, as nicely as you can ask without actually punching someone's ticket. Yeah, we gave her a few broken ribs, took out a few teeth and cut her face up pretty good, but it was nothing that she couldn't have lived with". Eoin sighed and took a deep breath before continuing. "Now, this is where it all starts to gets a bit weird. As I said I was with some of the lads, and that included Pol and Cookie and you know what those two are like – especially when they've had a few. They made the decision to sample the goods that she had sworn Digger had never touched. But when they held her down, lifted her dress and ripped off her draws they got the shock of their lives. You see she had no cunt".

Hector stared open mouthed at his brother, caught up in the suspense of the story.

"What she did have was this sort of long, fleshy tentacle that hung down to her mid-thighs, bit like a Grandpa's wrinkled cock – only much, much bigger. It had pulsing grey veins and seemed to ripple every now and then. Cookie who was down at the business end screamed like a stuck pig, pulled out a knife and started jabbing at the monstrosity. It was after about the fifth or sixth time he stabbed at the thing that it started moving about, suddenly rearing up three feet or so from her body before starting to writhe around hideously in the air. The end didn't have any teeth as far as I could see, but it made this horrible sucking noise. Never heard anything like that sound before and don't want to again. You see Hecky, Doc was sort of right all along, something like a leech had sucked poor Dodds dry and we had just made it angry ! ".

"She he was a mutie all along". It was a statement, not a question. Hector didn't think that he'd actually failed to shit out any of that rotten squirrel, but he still thought he could feel something rising up his throat from his stomach. "What did you do ? "

"Pol looked at Cookie, Cookie looked at Pol. I think they were both in shock, so I stepped in and smashed her head in with a tyre-iron. I must have pulped that girls head and brain to mush, and still that thing attached to her waved around like it had a life of its own. It only stopped when Pol snapped out of his delirium, pulled his homemade and blew it apart. Course, Cookie wasn't happy about being covered in mutie-blood and shit, and I think that under any other circumstances he'd have pulled one of his blades and gone at Pol with abandon. But this wasn't in any ways normal. We burnt the body there in the alley and doused the walls of the do-goody Samaritans house for measure".

Hector swallowed hard. He wasn't afraid of any man, he had after all stopped counting the people – men, woman and children – he had murdered years ago. But mutants really turned his stomach. Many people said that not all the irradiated freaks were bad, that many of them were just like 'us' normal people and deserved a chance in life. That it wasn't their fault they were born 'different' and that they didn't mean us any real harm. Some of the locals rumored that the huge behemoth Wendy had taken on recently as a doorman was one of them too, though no-one he knew of had been brave – or stupid enough - to ask her if it was true. However, as far as he himself was concerned the only good mutie was a dead mutie, and he would be more than happy to join in beating any one of them to death – at a distance of course, and with the longest possible stick he could find.

Eoin licked his lips. "So, you still sure you want to be the one to sample the goods first ?"

Hector screwed his face up for several seconds and then visibly relaxed. "OK, You can go first. Just don't leave her too messy".

Eoin prodded his brother in the chest with a chubby finger. "I'll do better than that Hecky, I'll pull out before I shoot my load".

"You'd do that for me ?" asked Hector.

"Sure. What are brothers for ?" Eoin smiled and looked out again from their hiding place, the little blonde now only about thirty meters away. "She's nearly here. Now, we need to get ready quickly. Usual plan. I'll step out when she pulls up alongside, you double back and come at her from behind. By the look of her physically I don't think she'll put up much of a fight, but even though she don't appear to be armed that don't mean she can't pull something on us, so be careful bro'. Now go Hecky and be in position ready for when I come out"

The brothers clasped hands and Hector hastily left their hideout under the cover of the branches and leaves they had purposely piled up parallel to the path for just this purpose.

Eoin laughed silently to himself. Hector was so gullible. His lie about not coming inside her was about as true as his story about the leech-woman killing Digger Dodds.

* * *

Hector had just got into position when he saw his brother step out on to the track ahead.

"Hold it right there girly", he heard Eoin say, pointing the opening maw of the fake firearm right between his young victims eyes from less than spitting distance.

It had the desired effect and she froze, one leg slightly raised from being about to kick a pebble, one gloved hand carrying a white and yellow flower halting midway to her nose. She also stopped humming the most out of tune song Hector had ever heard in his life.

A few months back Hector had owned his first firearm, a scratch build monstrosity that a travelling vendor had sold him as 'cheap but reliable'. The only word in that description that had been true was the word 'cheap', for the whole thing had blown up in his face in a cloud of black powder, springs and metal tubing two weeks later. Since then he had reverted back to using his faithful Bowie knife – unlike a gun you didn't have to worry too much about the upkeep of a knife – quick scrape on a stone every now and then to keep it sharp and that was it. Firearms needed an attention he was not prepared to give them. Besides a firearm was pretty useless without anything to load into it and any kind brass in these parts was both rare and expensive. No, he'd stick with his blade, there was something satisfying about seeing the lights go out on someone's face from up close, watching them as they reluctantly accepted Deaths skeletal embrace.

Hector wiped his right hand on his trousers and slid the Bowie knife out of the leather sheath hanging from his belt. It felt as natural in his hand as his own cock did, and he'd fucked people with both of them with similar satisfaction. He didn't need to be too stealthy about coming out of hiding, the girl was after all on her own, and from the looks of it pretty occupied with having the living- shit scared out of her by his brother.

"Fuck it", an errant leafed-twig sprung back slapping Hector full in the face as he made his way on to the path and he rubbed his cheek with his free hand to try and sooth away the stinging sensation. He looked once behind him just to be on the safe-side and then turned and quickly made his way up to the one-sided tableau ahead.

As he approached he heard Eoin say "So sweet-cheeks, what's a fine young lady doing out here all on her lonesome?, the last word sounded more like 'lonethome' due to his dental issues.

The girl moved her head to one side.

Hector could not see her face from behind, so could not read what was on it. He presumed the blonde had been so startled by Eoin's appearance that she had not heard or understood the question. His brother repeated what he had said with bit more venom in it this time, but her only response was to bizarrely move her head to the other side.

It started running through Hectors mind that maybe they had cornered some inbred dolt, with too many of her father/brothers genes in her, when she slowly started raising the hand not carrying the flower in it, the gloved index finger outstretched.

Eoin took a step forwards. "Easy girl. Don't wanna have to blow your pretty head off them shoulders of yours. Least not yet"

The girl stopped the momentum of her arm but twisted the angle of her hand to point at her ear.

"Why the fuck are you pointing at the side of your head ?" asked Eoin.

She sighed, and jabbed her finger at her ear several times in quick succession.

Eoin, bemused, looked over her head to Hector, the action causing the girl to swivel at the waist and take in the second man standing behind her. Hector smiled at the familiar 'frightened rabbit' look in her pale blue eyes. It was a smile she did not return.

At an age of about the young girl's Hector had raped his first woman. He'd not really known what he was doing back then and by the end had made a right mess of his rite of passage into manhood. His elder friends had told him that just threatening a bitch should be enough for her to drop her drawers and open her legs for him, but this one had had other ideas and struggled like a worm on a hook. She had punched Hector, clawed his skin with her sharp nails, kicked him, and at one point when he had tried to kiss her neck she had bitten off a part of his left ear. The final straw had been when she had somehow got a knee underneath him and kneed him in the groin, causing him to feel like he wanted to vomit. She relaxed visibly after he introduced his blade to her internal organs, after which getting his engorged dick in her was a lot easier. To this day he was still not sure if the whore had died before he had entered her or expired whilst he was on the job.

Since then he had raped many women. Young or old, black or white, it made no difference to him, when the urge came upon him, the urge needed satisfying. And that urge needed satisfying more frequently – and violently - as time drew on.

Hector could feel saliva creeping out of the corner of his mouth as he thought about what he was going to do to the young girl and he smeared it off with the back of the hand holding the Bowie.

"Hey", shouted Eoin, 'don't look at that ugly bastard when I'm talking to you". The girl paid him no heed and continued to stare at Hector as if she had not heard him.

Hector winked at his brother, "Ha, maybe the little princess finds me more attractive than you. You do have a face like the butt of a well ridden ass".

Eoin Grabbed her by one of her petite shoulders and forcefully pulled her round to face him, giving her a hard back-hander when she finally had him in view. She crumpled to the ground in a heap, her head in her hands.

"You know, I just had a thought", said Hector. "I think she might a deaf mute".

Eoin thought for a moment and then nodded. "Yeah, kind of makes sense, especially that silly pointing at her ears nonsense. Bit of a shame though really, Hecky".

"Yeah ? Why's that?" asked Hector.

"I kinda like them showing some appreciation of my cock up them!" said Eoin. He bent down and grabbed the girl by a handful of hair, yanking her head back so she was looking up at him. There were twin streaks of tears from her watery eyes and a line of scarlet ran from a split lip to her jaw. Her chin quivered a little and her small chest rose and fell erratically as she sucked in uneven breaths. "But, if the only thing we have to deal with when fucking you is listening to our own grunting, we can live with that. Won't spoil our fun, darling. You might even find out you're not mute after all when you've been ridden a few times by us both".

Eoin looked up from the downed girl to get his brother's agreement, but Hector was looking the other way. He raised a questioning eye-brow when he looked back.

"Thought I heard a twig snap or something".

"Probably another one of those Nuke-spawned, un-edible squirrels", joked Eoin

"Maybe" pondered the taller brother peering uncertainly again behind him, "but a fucking big-one if it was!"

Eoin followed Hector's gaze but couldn't see anything. "Yeah, well we'd best get outta sight with Precious here anyway. She might be on her own, but that don't mean others won't be coming along any time soon and I don't fancy sharing her with anyone other than you Bro'"

Straightening back to his full height, Eoin pulled the girl to her feet by the roots of her hair. She squirmed weakly in his grasp and when he raised the other hand with the gun in it as though he was going to give her a more substantial bruise on the other side of her face, she appeared to get the message and stopped struggling. Positioning himself behind her and deliberately brushing his groin against her slim thighs in the process, he started pressing her forwards.

"I wonder if she is a virgin" asked Hector, his attention now fully back on their captive, the apparent noise behind him forgotten. "Never had me one of those before".

"And you aint gonna have one this time either ! We agreed I'm first, Hecky. I'll take her to the Shack, give you a shout when I'm done with her. Loosen her up a little for that huge cock of yours you keep talking about".

Both brothers laughed simultaneously at the joke as Eoin shoved the girl off the track towards the screen of bushes that he had so recently emerged from. With her back to her ambushers, neither of them could see the brief but definite smile that played over the young girl's features and it was gone by the time she had passed into the duos secretive lair.

* * *

When the McFadden brothers had stumbled across the ambush site – mostly thanks to the telltale sickly scent of its slowly decomposing previous owner– they had shortly after discovered the 'Shack'.

It was an ugly construct, clumsily erected around the remains of what Eoin said was a large children's playhouse. Hector had no idea why kids needed their own small houses but thought that if they did then maybe some of those pre-nuke parents had more in common with the post-apocalyptic generation than he gave them credit for – the only difference being that for some reason they built the children somewhere to spend the night in to think about a beating they taken.

Overall the structure was about six by eight feet, stood about five feet high and appeared to be made of some sort of plastic imitation wooden panels.

There were windows set in each of the three remaining sides about thirty inches above the dirt floor, and a fake stubby chimney still resolutely attached after a hundred years to the one half of the plastic roof that hadn't been blown away. The missing roof panel had been replaced with corrugated iron and plastic sheeting, whilst a pair of rusty old van doors with missing handles made up the last wall and allowed a simple albeit awkward access. It was cramped but, allowed them to comfortably sleep side by side, and if there had originally been anything of any real value in there, the corpse of the tenant they found had taken that secret to the grave with him.

Now they used it for sleeping in on cold nights, playing cards on rainy days and forcefully fucking as much passing pussy as they could. It was nowhere near soundproofed, but at a five minute hike through thick woodland from where they preyed on the unprepared or unwary it really didn't need to be.

Eoin had once said that there should be a main house in the vicinity, but they never found it. The ground was rippled and ridged in many places from historic Earth tremors and it was possible that any residential dwelling had been swallowed up and digested long ago, leaving only the child's playhouse as testimony to it ever existing.

Hector stirred a pot of cold coffee with a stick and then replaced the lid. He had brought the still warm pot from the Shack when they had left it several hours ago. They did all of their cooking at the Shack, away from the path and the clearing, though they still used the coal fed fire-pit here now and then to keep themselves warm on cold mornings. The wafting John Doe they had found had proved the point of never having anything smelly near the ambush position – smelling roasting meat or a pot of boiling coffee would have had people wary long before they ever came within striking distance

He put the spout of the pot to his lips, took a deep swig of the contents and swirled it around his yellowed teeth. It tasted bitter and nothing like the sachet of Real coffee he had once traded a small fortune in furs for. That had been several years back, but he remembered the taste like it was yesterday – compared to that, this homemade stuff tasted like a mixture of bark, worn socks and boot polish. He swallowed it, pulled a face and felt it coldly slide down the inside of his throat to his stomach which momentarily seemed to want to reject it before settling down. Hector put the pot an arms-reach away and leaned back against a tree trunk, shifting slightly to accommodate a knotted knoll that protruded into one his kidneys.

Life was not bad most of the time he considered, not bad at all. The brothers ate and drank well most of the time, fucked and slept in relative safety and when the supply of people to prey was abundant they had plenty of jack for supplies and the additional expensive whore at the Pussy Palace. Unfortunately though he had to admit the last two months had been relatively quiet – the girl they had today was the first traveler they had hijacked for the past three weeks, and whilst they might get their rocks off with her until they grew bored of her, he had already rifled through her back-pack and found little of sellable value other than a change of clothing - the necklace he had seen from a distance was nothing more than a polished stone on a piece of string.

Assuming that she kept most of her looks after they had finished with her, he supposed that maybe they could sell her to Wendy instead of killing her. He made a mental note to exchange the thought with Eoin when it was his turn with the girl later.

Of course Donovan would want a cut out of anything Wendy paid them for the girl – but paying the sergeant of the local Baron's sec force at Knotted Creek to turn a blind eye to their small operation was a relatively mild expense compared to the alternative of a lynching in the ville's square, which was the mandatory sentence the Baron imposed for lost trade.

Hector yawned. He had risen from a restless night prior to dawn, hours before the stars had started disappearing from the sky. His brother's repetitive tooth-wheeze in the tight confines of the Shack had kept him awake most of the night and when he had managed to nod off on occasions some sort of carnivorous insect with a taste for human flesh had somehow crawled down in-between his butt cheeks and relentlessly bitten him.

Thinking that Eoin had been gone for only about ten minutes now and was probably just about getting going, Hector breathed deeply, closed his tired eyes and listened to the background ambience of the forest.

Within moments he had drifted off to sleep.

* * *

Hector awoke with a start, his senses on alert. He listened carefully. There was something coming his way from the direction of the Shack, something big and heavy. His initial thought was that it could be his brother returning to tell him it was his turn on the filly, though he usually did not make that much commotion unless he was drunk.

Eoin had tried to force some of their homebrew down the young girls throat from his battered hip-flask before he left, but had spilled most of it against her tightly closed lips and after that there couldn't possibly have been enough left in it for him to get inebriated on. There was certainly no more up at the Shack – at least as far as he knew of, and he had snooped quite a bit in that regard when his brother wasn't there.

Besides which, drunk or not, Eoin knew every way back that avoided all the dry twigs, bracken and tins on strings that they had placed on the approach to clearing to warn them of interlopers, and this trespasser made no effort of stealth whatsoever, seemingly not bothered in the slightest by the snapping of sticks and jangling of old beer cans.

Maybe it was a bear of some kind, a cub possibly. There were relatively few large cats in the area and some sort of wasting disease had killed off anything canine further back than he could put a date to. The possibility of a juvenile bear though worried him and his heart beat that little bit faster, for where you found a cub you generally found an eight foot tall irate mother bear with claws as big as your head that could disembowel you with one swish of a limb. And those were just the un-mutie variety.

Carefully getting up from the ground and removing his knife, he slid behind the tree he had been dozing against. It didn't offer much protection against the ferocity of an angry bear, but it was a darn sight better than standing out in the open, a sole and obvious target.

The approaching movement stopped for a while, shuffled about a bit and then continued on again towards him several seconds later. He gripped the handle of the Bowie that extra bit tighter, feeling the familiarity of the grip like the hips of a well-known gaudy.

It ran though his head quickly that Donovan had sold them out and had come looking for the brothers, that maybe they had taken that one too many from the path or that they had accidentally victimized someone of importance to the Baron. But that made little sense - Donovan was as greedy as he was fat, and certainly not stupid enough to give up a regular payday. It also made little sense that he would try to take the brothers out singlehandedly and without a large portion of his sec-force to back him up. So that scenario seemed unlikely.

As the seconds ticked away slowly, Hector's bald spot began to itch once more and he felt a bead of sweat run down his temple from his hairline. He bit a jagged thumb nail, listening intently for any further tell-tale signs of who or what it could be

Suddenly, he saw movement. It was now only about fifteen feet or so beyond the other side of the clearing, but several of the trees obscured him getting a clear view. Whatever it was however was about the height of a man, and walking upright on two legs. He also caught flashes of red and white about head high as the thing wavered either side of trunks.

Now Hector could begin to pick up what sounded like a low, animalistic moan coming from it. People didn't make noises like that did they ? – least not normal ones. So, beast or mutie it was. He'd get a good glance at it, see if it was something he could handle and then decide on a 'fight or flight' response. He wished Eoin would hurry up and shoot his load and come back for support, but he was probably still occupied pumping up and down on the girl and oblivious to his plight.

Finally there was just one tree between it and Hector and he swallowed hard bracing himself, the hand with the blade nervously shaking a little. "Come on, fucker" he said under his breath, trying to pump his bravado up and calm himself down at the same time.

It failed miserably, for when it finally staggered into view at the edge of the tree line Hector felt his bowls loosen and he pissed himself.

* * *

It was Eoin after all. Or what was left of him.

Hector's chin dropped and he stared aghast at his brother. The entire right side of Eoin's face was gone. From the forehead to the lower jaw, the skin, muscle and tissue had all been torn away, revealing the bright white of his skull, his rotten teeth and lolling tongue beneath. His right eye dangled on a string-like optical nerve and bumped repetitively against cheek bone as his brother plodded forwards, arms by his side. Hector thought he saw something pinky-grey in the cavity left by the eye, but it could have been just his imagination working overtime as he stared at the horrific image. The nose was missing, and his brother breathed out a plethora of bloody bubbles from the open nasal cavity that streamed down over his lower jaw, his neck and bare chest where it matted his tightly curled ginger hair in wet, soggy clumps.

His underwear was hitched at an angle, like he had tugged them up in a hurry, akin to a kid that had been found jerking himself off by a parent, and the blood that came from the head wound was nothing like the torrent of thick blood that ran down his brother's thighs and legs from whatever injury he had sustained to his partially hidden groin area. Hector had seen men bleed to death from severed arteries before and it did not take his limited imagination much time to grasp that that was what had probably happened to Eoin.

When Hector looked further down the familial monstrosity he saw Eoin's trousers were caught around his ankles, one boot completely obscured inside the leg of the pants. Hampered by the restrictions on his movement and his severe injuries it was a miracle of miracles he had actually managed to make it back he thought.

The once Eoin thing shuffled into the clearing with a mass of hungryflies in its wake, but rather than rush to help him, Hector hid back behind the tree trunk. He closed his eyes. Maybe that fucked up mutie-squirrel was intent on even more revenge for being eaten for supper and was giving him bad dreams. Maybe if he pinched himself he would wake up from this torrid nightmare and his brother would be smiling down ready to tag him in.

His older brother Eoin had been there for as long as he could remember, protected him from the older kids and all those adults that preyed on children as they grew up, and when Anne - their mother - had been murdered by one of her more violent customers he had taken on an almost fatherly role until Hector had reached puberty and was more able to defend himself. He owed Eoin, big time - even if it was only to end his new and miserable existence.

But, 'something' had done this to him – and probably to the girl at the same time too. And whatever it was was probably still out there. Possibly even following behind in his brother's footsteps.

He steeled himself and cautiously peered around the tree again, his hapless brother now standing almost central in the woodland clearing. He was turning from side to side. Hector assumed he was trying to locate him but was having difficulties focusing with eyes that now pointed in two completely different directions.

The twisting movement of his head also revealed to Hector a series of circular marks on the left side of his face, though they paled into insignificance when compared to the utter carnage of the devastated right.

Hector leaned out a little more, and after a few seconds his brother seemed to notice him.

Eoin raised his arms a little and once more began shuffling forwards. He appeared to be trying to talk, but with the extreme tissue loss the words were unintelligible and their meaning lost. Hector clung to the trunk, unsure if his brother was trying to warn him or was begging his kin to grant him a mercy that he had never in his life shown to others.

He lumbered slowly ever closer, but when he was no more than the length good sized horse away his trouser-tethered legs caught on an upturned root and he fell forwards.

Eoin made no effort to try to protect himself from the fall, his strength now fully depleted and though his arms were outstretched slightly from his scarlet painted torso they simply collapsed under the weight of his body. The already destroyed right-side face impacted with an almighty crack on the upturned coffee pot Hector had been drinking from, scraping the already torn skin and scalp further up his exposed skull. His jaw distorted and teeth flew high in the air like they had been hit by a hammer struck with the force of an experienced and well-muscled blacksmith. He didn't rise again, but his death-rattle scared the flies away for a short time before even those movements gradually subsided and they returned en-masse.

Hector didn't watch his brother's final seconds. He was far more engrossed in what had been revealed behind his brother after he had fallen. A horror that made his brothers mutilated corpse seem quite tame by comparison.

The girl he and his brother had absconded from the path stood there, no longer the sweet looking, innocent child that they had taken her to be. Now she was an abominable specter from the deepest depths of Dante's Inferno, a creature straight out of the deranged mind of an insane Bible Thumping Preacher intent on scaring his audience into submission. And worst of all she was looking right at him.

Suddenly the security of having just a tree between himself and this apparition felt wholly inadequate.

* * *

Unable to contend with her intense blue-eyed gaze Hector broke eye-contact and reluctantly looked his brother's killer up and down.

The clothing that he had first seen the young girl wearing when he had spied her out on the path was now covered in what he assumed to be his brothers blood, her drenched t-shirt sticking to her petite figure and hips in what at any other time Hector would have found arousing. Her slim legs were relatively clean compared to her upper half, but the few ruby teardrops on her white shoes were stark contrast against their lack of color.

The girl's hair now hung loose from her two ponytails, spattered with a crimson that matched the smears of red on her face where she had obviously tried to clear her vision of what should have been still pumping through Eoin's veins .

But it wasn't the general state of her disheveled appearance or the fact that she was now smiling at him with an evil smile that should be unknown to one of her age that chilled him to the bone - it was her now ungloved hands and what was in one of them.

Her right hand held what appeared at first to be a raw and freshly cut piece of meat, her fingers gripping the flesh so hard that blood pooled on her knuckles before dripping to the floor where it painted the forest carpet. Hector guessed that the contents of that hand was probably one half of his brother's face, and even though that made him swallow hard, her empty left hand terrified him far more.

Eoin's story of Old Digger Dodds came unbidden into his mind.

The girls left hand was not human - well not fully anyhow. There was a series of sucker pads along the inside of each finger, from just under the tip down to where they joined the palm. The palm itself too was covered in the pads, though the ones here were slightly larger than those on the fingers. Independent but in unison the pads opened and closed, emitting a wet kissing noise that to Hector in his heightened state of terror seemed far louder than anything that small had a right to sound.

Hector had heard about 'stickies' from drinking companions and visiting traders to the gaudies - though he had never actually seen one in real life. They infested tales of terror that brave and scared men told each other around dwindling campfires to while away the time until dawn.

But the creatures in the stories were real, and if the conversation he had overheard between the dangerous looking black-haired man with one-eye and the grizzly old convoy veteran leader were true - and he doubted that such hard-looking men made things up - the stickies even outnumbered the human populations in certain areas.

Suddenly, with a quick flick of her wrist the contents of her right hand flew through the air, a blur of motion that ended with a sickening squelch against the tree Hector was still partially hidden behind, the little blood still in the fleshy missile spattering his face and upper neck from the impact. He watched it for a brief moment as it stuck there motionless to the bark of the tree, and then followed it to the floor after the adherence from the force of the throw inevitably surrendered its hold to gravity.

When the lump came to rest, for a moment he did not recognize what he was staring at. He had expected to see the torn off half of Eoin's face staring up at him, but it looked kind of odd. He didn't remember the hair on his brother's chin being so long and so dark in color, or the scabby pustules that infested the skin. He certainly didn't remember his brother having such a bulbous red end to his nose. Then he sickeningly realized he wasn't looking at his Eoin's face, but the gory remnants of his groin. The human-stickie hybrid bitch ripped off his brother genitals.

She was much further into the clearing now, gore from her fingers dotting the landscape behind her as she moved. Finally his 'flight' response overwhelmingly decided that running away was the better option and he started to take steps back, mirroring the oncoming approach of the nightmarish creature.

One of the biggest rules in ambushing strangers on a road - or any woodland path for that matter - was to know your surroundings, and Hector liked to think that he had spent many a long hour memorizing the layout around their position. He knew every small hillock, every dip in the ground, and every bush, branch and tree, even blindfold on a dark night he thought he could navigate the area if required. So he was somewhat alarmed when his lower back bumped into something big that should not have been there, it yielded slightly but not by much. Hector unwillingly pulled his gaze away from the girl and slowly turned to see what was blocking his exit and freedom.

A man stood there.

The newcomer was slightly taller that his own six-foot-one and had a shoulder length black hair that contrasted sharply with his pale looking skin. He was clean-shaven, statuesquely handsome and even though Hector could not see his eyes through the wrap around shades he wore, he felt them boring unerringly into him. He was dressed in a knee-length brown leather coat, a blue denim shirt, combat fatigues and boots that looked like they had been taken straight out of the factory box that morning. His arms were crossed over his chest, and although he seemed to have two firearms safely strapped to his back, the lack of an actual weapon in his hands failed to take away the threatening aura the figure seemed to possess in abundance.

Hector's normal instinct would have been to bring up the blade, swing it inwards and hope that his knife honing skills over the years had sharpened the blade to the extent that it could pass through the leather and into the ribs and heart of the man who was blocking his escape. But his hand didn't move. He willed it to, but there was something about this stranger that had him mesmerized - like a fat rat in the eyes of a cobra. He watched in what appeared to be slow motion as the ominous figure unfolded one of his arms, raised his hand to the glasses he wore and casually removed them with his delicate white fingers.

The revealed eyes terrified him even more than the hybrid-horror girl that was stalking across the clearing towards his unprotected rear. The irises of the eyes were red - not the pinky hue of the few albinos he had seen in the Deathlands - but the same the color as the blood of his brother now soaking into the ground a few paces away. They were flecked with small splinters of orange.

But it wasn't the unusual red that had held him captive, it was the fact that the whites of the eyes were not white, but a deep and eternal black, that when combined with the irises made it appear that there were small fires burning deep within the sockets. They looked like they could read a man's soul, pass judgement and deal out an immediate and lethal justice.

Hector was sure he could see his guilt written in them tenfold along with his own reflection.

The newcomer smiled a smile with his slim lips, revealing a perfectly white set of teeth whose incisors looked to be about a quarter of an inch longer than they should have done. Slowly he brought his face in until it was no more than six inches away from Hector's.

"Boo!" the apparition said.

* * *

Hector's world seemed suddenly full of monsters from children's nightmares.

He started pacing backwards, past the tree he had been hiding behind and into the clearing. His subconsciousness screamed a warning at him - that his brother's corpse and the girl that had mutilated him were waiting there- but the part of his conscious that dictated his movements would have none of it. Hector's boot brushed against something, the sensation bringing him out of his semi-comatose state. He looked down at his brother's ruined head, large cream colored ants already crawling over the wet muscle and exposed tissue, seemingly quite content to share the abundant food with the flies who had their own agenda.

There was a tugging sensation on his back, then his shoulder, and the young girl's face suddenly appeared at his left cheek.

"Hi ya", she said cheerfully, waving one suckered hand in front of Hector's face. "It's just little ol'me again !"

Hector - completely oblivious to the fact that he had thought her to be mute a short while ago - swallowed hard, his attention riveted on the small mouths on her fingers and palms that opened and closed mere inches from his nose, a milky residue coming from each of them. He noticed absently that she had a tattoo on her wrist that had previously been hidden under the rim of her gloves - it read A44 FX. At that moment it seemed like the most unimportant thing in the world.

"Now Hecky" continued the girl, "Me and Pops here - though mostly me since Captain Mysterious over there don't talk that much - are going to have a little chat with you. But before we start, I'm going to ask you nicely to drop that nasty little tooth-pick of yours for me".

At first Hector hesitated, but when the suckered-hand moved itself closer and brushed the skin of his scarred cheek before moving down and clamping around his neck, his trembling fingers made up their own mind and the silver-steel dropped and embedded itself in the leafy ground.

"There's a good boy". The mutie/girl lifted her head as if to address her male companion who had now made his way closer, but she said nothing.

The man flashed those over-sized incisors again. "All yours, Amy".

Hector had half expected a gravelly voice to have issued those words, but what he heard was deep, smooth and had an almost hypnotic quality to it.

Amy turned her mouth towards her captives ear. "So Hecky, are you ready ?"

Hector managed a uncomfortable nod, not wanting to move his neck too much in-case those stickie fingers tore at his skin".

"Now, as you can see I am not like normal girls. When God made me fourteen summers ago, he gave me a little something extra to help me survive in this harsh and unpredictable world. And yes, before you say it I know some people - probably including you and your late brother too - would call me a mutie. But that's OK, I've learned to live with it and make allowances for people's intolerance and ingrained stupidity. And, boy, you wouldn't believe just how stupid some of those stupid people really were - least until they learned different, anyhows"

Amy paused, and shifted her grip on Hector's neck slightly, causing the trapped man's Adams apple to bob up and down involuntarily.

"But in all of my years, I have never had to live off of people the way that you do. Sure, I've stolen from folks to eat or clothe myself when the need arose and I couldn't find any honest work to pay my way - and as you can imagine finding work where people don't condemn me for my God's 'gift' isn't easy. I could have become like you, but I chose the right way even it was the hardest thing to do. I always tried to fit in to 'their' world, I really did. On occasions I found places that accepted me, safe places, places I could call home if only for a little while. But, you know what ? No matter where I went or what I did, there were always unsavory people like you and your brother lurking around who wanted to take advantage of me in one way or another. Men - and the occasional women - that saw me as nothing more than a means to satisfy their own twisted needs. Am I making myself clear so far Hecky ?".

Hector carefully lifted his head up and down.

"Well, it seems to me" she continued "that you and your brother have spent way too long living off the misery of others, and as I am sure you understand, that really needs to stop. Your brother Eoin on the trek up to your 'shack' went into great detail about what you had both done to each and every one of the women and girls you had abducted after you'd killed their menfolk - I think he thought it would frighten me somehow and I'd be more compliant. Hell, Hecky some of those things you made those poor people do not even the most depraved of whores in the dirtiest of gaudies would have done with you for all the jack in a rich Baron's vault! If there were ever a prize for unhealthy lust, I'm sure both you and Eoin would up there vying for first place - with that bastard Mr. Stokes of course".

She paused to get her breath.

"The question now - for both you and us - is how do we re-educate you, so that it never happens again ? How do we save the lives of all those would be victims of your desires and sexual fantasies ? How do we ensure that no more good people get unmarked graves in these parts? You see, me and Pops don't live hereabouts and it's a long way for us to come and check on you to see if you're keeping to any agreement we might make today. And to be honest that's a real big doozie of a problem - for all of us".

Hector felt her legs tighten around his sides and watched in slow motion as the hand that was not fastened to his throat moved up to his forehead, the alienesque fingers clamping on the skin there.

"So Hecky, I think maybe it's for the best if we just get rid of the problem!"

The moment the last syllable left in her mouth Amy pulled her hand away from Hector's throat, the suckers on her palms and fingers still resolutely attached to his unshaven skin. For a moment the built in elasticity checked the momentum and the flesh was stretched to its uttermost limits, but then the skin began to tear where she had embedded her fingertips and she ripped it free.

Hector stood motionless for several seconds, submerged in a combined coma of disbelief and shock, deep arterial blood beginning to jet from the obscene hole in his throat, a human made red-rain that pulsed in time to his heartbeat.

Amy jumped from his back, rolled and turned, watching as the doomed man came round to his terrifying new reality and raced his hands up to the ghastly chasm to try and staunch the unstoppable tide with his fingers. It worked partially, but his heart had started pumping with such a vigorous adrenaline that it pushed between the gaps in is fingers and around the jagged edges in his neck. His eyes started darting around the clearing searching for some improbable help and then he started involuntarily retching, finally throwing up a mixture of sick, bile and blood that landed over the toes of his boots.

Standing, Amy watched him try to fight off the inevitable, squeezing the still warm lump of flesh that still remained in her hand. There was never anything pretty about death, but watching an evil and selfish piece of scum like this man finally get what was owing to him was kind of satisfying in its righteous but gory way.

She pondered briefly about if duo had discussed the moment of their future deaths over a fire one night - whether it would be in a gung-ho shout in a violent blaze of glory, a last thrust between the thighs of their hundredth gaudy of the night or even as unlikely as it seemed in a final labored breath at the ripe old age of fifty-something. But she very much doubted that Hector had foreseen that he would die with his face buried in his brother's rear-end, for when the air failed to circulate enough to his brain, his legs gave way beneath him and he collapsed face-first into Eoin's partially clad buttocks. He raised his head once as if about to complain about the undignified end, but his body had nothing left to give and Hector's cheek returned to the soft and hairy pillow almost gracefully .

His last conscious thought before oblivion was that up close the man with the crazy eyes could have been the twin of the one-eyed convoy-hand that had he overheard talking about the stickies.

Amy let go of her grizzly trophy and turned her attention from the heaped bodies to Pops. "Well?"she said.

"Well, what" came the response.

"Sheesh ! Marks out of ten of course".

Pops laughed, as he approached her. "Eight, possibly an eight and a half".

He offered her an old shirt to wipe herself down with, one that he had picked up off the cluttered floor somewhere.

"An eight and a half? Are you kidding me ? Did you see the way I handled that S.O.B. ? The way I frightened the life out of him and took him down with one hand ?" Amy's cheeks reddened slightly. "That's gotta be worth more than an eight and a half ? Surely ?"

"Be fair" said Pops, "he was backing away from 'me' when you jumped on him. I put him that position for you to take advantage of. And..."

"And what ?" This time it was Amy's turn to ask the question.

"We could have done with a little information before you killed him. Like, what's the Baron and the Sec force like in Knotted Creek. What sort of armament do they carry. Do they have any good wags, bikes or animals that could be used to chase us down or that we could appropriate if the need arises. Simple recce stuff, but important nonetheless. Even the best place to barter goods and eat could have been useful. He may even have known something about the B.S.H.".

Amy's mouth turned down a little in dejection.

Pops smiled after a moment. "Tell you what. Pretending to be deaf threw them off their guard and gave you a good edge. You also showed the value of dividing and weakening your enemy. It shows your learning, so I'll give you an extra one as a bonus point".

They had learned the McFadden brothers were in the area from kind hearted but lonely old crone whose only friend seemed to be three legged pig she had bizarrely named Roosevelt. She had told them in great detail of the modus operandi of the brothers and wanted nothing more in return other than 'kill the bastards' and that they sit and chat for a while and tell her a little of the outside world. It seemed the local populace knew about the McFaddens, but for some unknown reason the Knotted Creek Sec-force never acted on the evidence.

The information she gave had allowed them to form an enticing plan, one with Amy taking the lead and Pops following a loose but attentive hundred yards behind. It had also meant that Pops had witnessed Amy's Oscar winning performance of being deaf.

"Nine and a half ?" Dejection turned to elation and she started punching the air with the dirtied shirt, until Pops took it out of her hand and started to delicately wipe at a streak of scarlet on her eye-brow. "I thought Hector nearly made you once back there on the path", Amy said looking up into his black and red eyes.

"Yeah, I know, but what can you do? Even the most fleet of foot of us can be undone by the chaos of Mother Nature sometimes. And you'd do well to remember that".

Amy nodding her understanding. "So, we off to Knotted Creek now or what?"

Pops threw the shirt on the floor. "Well, first things first. I think you need a wash-down and a change of clothes. Walking into a ville looking the way you do now would just be asking for trouble".

Amy looked herself up and down, her skin and clothes stained far more than could ever be wiped away with an old piece of worn cotton. "Yeah, guess you're right. I do look a bit of a mess I suppose. I passed a small, fresh stream on my romantic walk with one of our dead friends over there. It's not far. I'll collect my things from the 'shack' and clean up on the way back. See you in twenty or so". She turned and started to leave.

He had seen the stream himself when he had followed Eoin and Amy, far enough away to not be seen or heard, but at a distance that he could still have stepped in at a moment's notice "And be careful what you take from there", Pops warned, "these two leeched off locals as well as travelers. Trying to trade anything that might be recognized by someone is a risk we don't want to take".

The teen held her hand up in an OK signal and disappeared into the trees singing to herself. Pops heard her voice slowly diminish as the forests soundproofing kicked in.

"Another one down, and another one down and another one bites the dust".

* * *

When Amy Childs returned to the clearing after washing herself down and changing into her spare set of clothes - this time a long sleeves pink shirt and a pair of denim dungarees - she spotted 'Pops' leaning back against a tree reading a book whose wrap around cover seemed to picture a bright shinny car, that even in her own vague knowledge of automobiles was old well before nukecaust. He appeared to be most of the way through it, with just the odd few pages left.

"Good book ?" she asked, as she approached him tugging her gloves further down her wrists, her tattoo once more invisible.

Pops brushed an errant lock of hair from eyes and looked up at her. "To be honest it's a bit..."he searched for a word, "'far-fretched' really. About a young guy in love with his car that keeps killing people"

"And just why does he keep killing people? He a Sec man or something?"

The man on the floor shook his head. "It's the car that's killing people".

"So he drives the car and kills people ?"

"No, no. He doesn't kill anyone", said Pops, ""The car drives itself he's not there"

Amy stared at the name on the cover and curled her top lip in an exaggerated face of disbelief. "Pft, I bet this King guy never sold many books. That's a real crap idea for a story!"

"Yeah, that's as maybe, but Casey has a few more by the same author back home in his library. I read one".

"Really ? What was that one about? A man made of metal that could shoot bullets out of his arse-hole, a kind hearted Baron or maybe even a school to teach children how to ride broomsticks or something?"

Pops put the book down in his lap. "Well to be honest, the one I read was about a woman that could make things happen through Telekinesis'.

"Telekawhat ?" Amy asked.

"Telekinesis. It means being able to control things purely through the use of thought". He tapped his temple with a finger.

"So, she could kill with a thought then?"

"Sort of".

"Wow, that's real cool power. Bam - your dead. Bet she was a real hard-arsed mutie bitch. I might give that one a read when we get home".

Pops smiled. Reading was not really Amy's thing. Unlike himself who could speed read through a medium sized book in less than 30 minutes, Amy would probably take months to finish it - assuming she had the patience to actually sit still for longer than ten minutes and not run off to the arcade and video room of the redoubt that she seemed to spend most of her life in.

He really should try and spend some more quality time with her, she was after all barely more than a child, no matter what she thought of herself, and children - especially young teenagers - needed guidance and love and most importantly, time. Maybe he should take more notice in her interests, take in a few of those old classic black and white comedy movies and cartoons that Casey had got her addicted to with some sweet microwave popcorn, or watch her die horribly and with great regularity in one of those video-games she liked so much.

Pops smiled, thinking of how furious she had been when she had thrown the game console across the room after being killed by a zombie in an old mansion house. He didn't really approve of those scary games - but compared to the modern day horrors outside their safe-haven, a plodding dead man you could run away from seemed quite tame.

He was not her biological father, but since rescuing her two years ago from her internment at 'Stokes's Farm' he felt a paternal attachment to her that he found himself at a loss to explain.

Amy noticed him grinning. "What's up?"

"Nothing", Pops replied. "Touch of wind perhaps".

Swiveling her head, Amy turned and took in the two corpses nearby. "You didn't, you know...?"

"What ? Feed ? On them ?" He laughed. "Give me a break".

"Why, what's wrong with them"'

"Seriously ?"

Amy put her hands on her hips. "They look OK to me. Pretty fresh, bit messy perhaps".

"The freshness is not an issue, nor is the mess you made of them"

"So?" said Amy, when Pops was not as quickly forthcoming as her impatient young mind wanted him to be. "What's the problem with Abbot and Costello over there".

Pops waved a hand in the direction of the McFaddens. "They're not as fresh as they appear".

"I don't understand". Amy swiped at a fly that had deviated from where it should be.

The dark haired man gracefully got up from the floor and tucked the book into his coat pocket in the same fluid motion. "Let's just say that I think they have eaten something very recently that didn't agree with them. I can smell it on them".

Amy automatically sniffed the air a few times in different directions, and then shook her head

"Your sense of smell is not as acute as mine. But, rest assured if we had not come along when we did, the illustrious duo would probably be dead within a month from now. And before you ask me what they ate, I'm going to take a wild guess and say that it was probably one of our furry friends up there, since I can smell it on them too".

Following his gaze, Amy looked up at the branches of the trees that overhung the bodies. An ever increasing number of two-tailed, black and white squirrels were congregating there watching the tableau below, their noses sniffing the air, their small hands intertwined as if in some kind of mutie-mammalian prayer.

Pops approached the girl and put his hand on her shoulder. "It's time for us to leave. We - or more specifically you - may have brought dinner to the party, but I don't think that we are invited to sit at the table".

Amy nodded, remembering a black and white pelt she had seen up at the Shack. "Yeah, and I suppose if you're right it's kind of a fitting end for the scum-bags. Both killed and eaten by something they preyed on".

Turning as one they left the clearing, carefully making their way through the green screen and out onto the path through the woods that Amy had been abducted from less than an eventful hour ago.

They never looked back.

* * *

As the leaves stopped moving in the bushes, one of the squirrels with abundantly more grey hair than the others started turning its head to and fro, taking in as best it could with its cataract ridden eyes all the others sat in the nearby branches. Finally it raised a tiny hand that held a small twig no more than six inches in length, a miniature gold bell attached to the end with a piece of vine. It shook the bell and a light tinkling filled the enclosure, all the squirrels in the trees immediately turning their attention to it, their ears twitching.

It squeaked once, twice and pointed the belled stick in the direction of the interlopers lying prone on the floor below. At first only one of the squirrels turned and started moving, another joined it, a third, then more until finally the whole army of black and white fur was on the move. They ran along the mossy branches, down the trunks, across the roots and over the forest floor to the McFadden bodies, where they encircled the corpses and sat and waited patiently on the bloodied grass for the elder squirrel to slowly make its way down.

When the graying squirrel eventually arrived on its arthritically twisted limbs, it limped to join the others in the ring around Hector and Eoin, a space regally left open for it. Its white cloudy eyes took in the bodies for several seconds and then once again it raised its small paw, the bell at the end of the stick catching a ray of sunlight that speared into the clearing. The congregation of small mammals lowered their heads as one, their moist noses pointing to the ground.

After half a minute where the only noise in the vicinity was the busy flies pestering the brother's remains, the old squirrel shook the bell twice and then waved the minute stick from left to right and back several times. When it stopped, it pulled its lips back in a mask of feral anger that revealed two rows of serrated, sharply pointed teeth and spoke in a series of high pitched sounds that only it and its close kin understood, the tone rising in both pitch and volume until the voice seemed too big for the small creature, before abruptly cutting off.

The squirrels launched themselves in a mass of animal fury, leaping onto the bodies and tearing at the exposed flesh and skin. They bit, clawed and tore chunks of meat, ravenously gobbling down the bloody flesh with an apparently insatiable hunger. They burrowed beneath clothing, pulled out hair and fought over the juiciest of tender morsels. Their fur turned from black and white to a slimy coat of red that stuck to their bodies that necessitated them holding on tighter with their claws lest they fall off and lose their feeding position.

Two of the squirrels broke away from the feeding frenzy and approached the elder, one holding what had been Hectors left eye and the other a chunk of what had been Eoin's heart. They placed them on the floor before it, bowed and then hurried back to satisfy their own needs.

Before the old squirrel painfully bent down and picked up the ragged piece of heart, he sent up a silent prayer. He thanked the great squirrel God both for the bounty of food and for retribution on the death of one of their kind. And most of all he wished his God to give the small, two-legged, yellow haired thing and her friend a safe journey to wherever they were going for helping them bring down their much larger foe.

* * *

Making their their way to the crest of the ridge, Amy raised her head sideways and looked up at her companion.

"Boo?" She let out a small laugh. "We are seriously going to have to work on your one liners, Pops".

The dark haired man looked down at her through the plastic of his shades. "It was the best thing I could think at the time. Anyhow, I've told you before, Amy. Don't call me Pops. Michael will suffice".

"Yeah, yeah. Same old, same old. But Boo ? Really ? You might be older than me but you don't show it sometimes".

Michael stopped in his tracks, watching her as Amy walked on ahead. She kicked a stone along the path and then altered her trajectory to kick it again, not noticing he had come to a halt.

"Older ?" He said to himself under his breath, "You have no idea girl. No idea whatsoever".

End Chapter 1


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